Home >> Hobbies >> Other Hobbies

How to Program Servo Motors

Hobbyists and roboticists use servo motors to control the operation of small mechanical devices. The servo motor rotates a tiny shaft through electrical pulses sent by a programmed signal. Based on what the device is, the motor can cause movements of various parts -- for instance, making the wheels turn on an RC racing car or the legs move on robotic toys. To create this programmed reaction, the servo motor must be connected to a motherboard with a circuit chip that can transmit data to the motherboard from a program on your PC.

Things You'll Need

Servo with cable wires
Motherboard
Circuit chip

Instructions

- 1
  Connect the servo motor that is already installed into the device into the motherboard. Locate the eight rows of three pins on the motherboard. Each row is considered 0 through 7.
- 2
  Connect the left servo cable that has three color-coded wires -- black, red, and yellow/white -- to the motherboard's signal pin, power pin and ground pin in row 0. Place the black wire in the ground pin, the yellow/white wire in the signal pin and the red wire in the power pin. The signal pin is closest to the circuit chip, the power pin is in the middle and the ground pin is on the outside -- farthest from the chip.
- 3
  Connect the right servo cable next to the left cable in pin row 1. Create your program of pulses in the PC in the basic language program of your choice. The amount of pulse width you indicate will cause the servo to turn the shaft in jolts, causing the wheels on the left or right side to move.

Other Hobbies